Increasing concern over the management and harvest of special forest products (SFP) from national forest lands has led to the development of new Forest Service policy directives. In this paper, we present a brief history of SFPs in the Western United States, highlighting the issues that necessitated new management direction. The new policy directives that led to the...

The forest industry within the northern region of the U.S. has declined notably in employment, mill numbers, wood consumption, and forest harvests since 2000?a downturn exacerbated by the recession of 2007 to 2009. Longer term industrial decline (since 2000) has been evidenced by reductions in secondary products (e.g., furniture) and print paper manufacturing which can...

The forest industry within the northern region of the United States has demonstrated a notable decline in terms of employment, number of mills, wood consumption, and forest harvests since 2000--a downturn exacerbated by the "Great Recession" of 2007-2009. Longer term industrial decline (since 2000) has been evidenced by reductions in secondary product (e.g.,...

The first completed annual inventory of South Dakota's forests reports almost 1.7 million acres of forest land. Softwood forests make up 74 percent of the total forest land area; the ponderosa pine forest type by itself accounts for 69 percent of the total.

In spring 2006 and 2007, sawmill capacity and wood utilization information was collected for selected mills in southeast Alaska. The collected information is required to prepare information for compliance with Section 705(a) of the Tongass Timber Reform Act. The total estimated design capacity in the region (active and inactive mills) was 289,850 thousand board feet (...

The first full annual inventory of West Virginia's forests reports 12.0 million acres of forest land or 78 percent of the State's land area. The area of forest land has changed little since 2000. Of this land, 7.2 million acres (60 percent) are held by family forest owners. The current growing-stock inventory is 25 billion cubic feet--12 percent more than in...

The second completed annual inventory of South Dakota's forests reports 1.9 million acres of forest land. Softwood forests make up 68 percent of the total forest land area, with the ponderosa pine forest type by itself accounting for 60 percent of the total.

The southern United States is a potential leader in producing biofuels from intensively managed, short rotation (8?12 years) woody crops such as southern pines, and native and non-native hardwoods. However, their accelerated development under intensive management has raised concerns that fast-growing bioenergy crops could reduce recharge to stream flows and groundwater...

Increased drought intensity and frequency due to climate change may reduce the abundance and activity of nitrogen (N2)-fixing plants, which supply new N to terrestrial ecosystems. As a result, drought may indirectly reduce ecosystem productivity through its effect on the N cycle. Here, we manipulated growing season net rainfall across a series of plots...

Questions related to economics figured prominently in the priority information needs identified in the 1997 Tongass Land Management Plan. Follow-on studies in economics werc designed to improve understanding of aspects of the competitiveness of the Alaska forest sector, links between Alaska timber markets and other markets as evident in prices, and the relationship...

Satellite imagery can potentially reduce the costs and time associated with ground-based forest inventories; however, for satellite imagery to provide reliable forest inventory data, it must produce consistent results from one time period to the next. The objective of this study was to temporally validate a Landsat-based volume estimation model in a four county study...

Nonnative invasive plants (IPs) are rapidly spreading into natural ecosystems (e.g., forests and grasslands). Potential threats of IP invasion into natural ecosystems include biodiversity loss, structural and environmental change, habitat degradation, and economic losses. The Upper Midwest of the United States encompasses the states of Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan...

Short-rotation woody crops in the southeastern United States will make a significant contribution to the growing renewable energy supply over the 21st century; however, there are few studies that investigate how species selection may affect water yield. Here we assessed the impact of species selection on annual and seasonal water budgets in unvegetated plots...